Saturday, 12 July 2014

Can we question Hamas without outrage?

So where do
you begin when trying to understand the hostility of the Muslim world towards
the state of Israel.
There are so many angles to it that one gets muddled in the end and wonder if
there is any logic to trying to negotiate peace in that region. But it is a
matter of seeing a ray of light in the dark tunnel to save the lives of the
civilians and innocent children on both sides which cannot be overlooked and
for that purpose alone I will analyse the seething anger in the Muslim world
against the Jewish state.

There is
less of outpour of anger against Baghdadi the self-proclaimed caliph whose
comments sparks fear that he is bent upon annihilating those who would disagree
with his ideas of caliphate and he particularly sights his targets towards the
Shias and the Jews, which makes him a dangerous character. This is by and large
an example of state of amnesia which freezes a sense of liability to be
defensive towards those regimes and extremist groups who want domination and
control for undemocratic purposes. The condemnation of the US operation Desert
Storm in 1992, against the forces of Saddam Hussein was widespread; the outpour
of concern to allow the US
to send forces in the region could not be matched by the machinations of Saddam
Hussein who was a dictator with a reputation of relying on violence against his
own people.

The
build-up and escalation of the situation in Israel/Palestine has once again
unleashed an out-pour of anger, rage and theories of harsh actions to compel Israel to back
down. The sentiments of a young Muslim girl living in the suburbs of
Connecticut and a boy living in the small town of Pakistan is pure rage and
only directed towards Israel who is he aggressor in this conflict. The
religious zealots are calling for Muslims to come and offer collective prayers
to rid the pain and suffering of the people of Palestinians and some are
chanting anti-Jewish sentiments. I found myself speechless when I cam across a
young Pakistani boy’s comment on Facebook, stating that it is essential to
‘send Pak forces to Palestine for fight,’ and the greedy politicians wont do it
because they are interested in earning dollars for themselves. He was bitter
and angry that there is no chance for the soldiers to fight a just war because
the state won’t agree to send the forces to Palestine. Today is Malala Yusoufzai’s
birthday and to commemorate the occasion in order to highlight the importance
of educating young girls can be overlooked, as I gathered from this comment on
twitter, ‘Why are you supporting Malala? Why don’t you support children of Palestine?’ I remember
three years ago asking a young Pakistani banker his opinion on the situation in
Syria
and he replied, ‘it is their problem, not ours.’

If Baghdadi
is a lone crusader trying to establish a Sharia state in the desert lands of Iraq and the end of the bloodshed of Syria is not an
immediate concern than why Palestine/Israel conflict an issue to provoke huge
outrage in the Muslim world? The
religious zealots have long ceased to see the insanity of Hamas to create human
shields and encourage little children to learn the art of weaponry. They are
drawing their conclusions from medieval frame of mind when scriptures
determined the purpose to create nations. Hamas is firing rockets on Israeli
civilians and the military actions in Gaza
are one of retaliation. The Palestinians suffered embargo because they amassed
a cache of weapons and never focused on building infrastructure which could
lead to a proper state. There can be no state of truce if one cannot see the
damage and destruction done with the purpose to avenge and destroy the enemy
without trying to analyse ones own wrong doing.

The rage in
the Muslim world towards the Israeli retaliation has to be matched by rational
debate which makes it visible that the tactics of Hamas to terrorize the people
of Israel
is also leading to the death of innocent Palestinians. The real question is who
is ready to make that debate?

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About Me

@mssolidarity is Salima Yakoob. She has written on extremism, war on terror and
international politics. Many times she stands corrected but refuses to bow down
to religious apologists and moderates with no agendas. Her degree in English
proved beneficial in understanding the several isms.

If @mssolidarity is not writing she is doing
school runs, reading books of all sorts and listening to London Grammar on her
ipod.

Her posts
can be sometimes off-track and overly imaginative, but you should forgive her. She
is only a writer.